hey

A2 Topic:Register & Style

US /heɪ/ See IPA manual

Homophones

hay /heɪ/ heigh /heɪ/

Freq #96

Meanings

1

intj
An informal way of saying hello.

Hey! How's it going?
2

intj
Said to get someone's attention.

Hey, look at this!
3

intj
Said to show surprise.

Hey, this is new!
4

intj
Said to protest or tell someone off.

Hey! Stop that!

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 intj · an informal way of saying... hi

2 intj · said to get someone's... oi

More ahem ahoycooeehelloheyohoihowdywotcherwow yoyoohooyowzah

Word family

Derived forms heydayheyoyehey

Related forms attention huh

Etymology

From Middle English hey, hei, also without h- in ey, from Old English *hē, ēa (interjection), attested as first element in hēlā, ēalā (“O!, alas!, oh!, lo!”). Cognate with Dutch hé, hei (“hi, hey”), German hei (“hey, wow”), Danish and Swedish hej (“hello, hey”), Faroese hey (“hey, hello”), Old Norse, Icelandic and Norwegian hei (“hey”), Polish hej (“hey, hello”), Romanian hei, Russian эй (ej, “hey”); see heigh. Probably a natural expression, as may be inferred from its presence with similar meaning in many other unrelated languages: for example, Burmese ဟေး (he:), Finnish hei, Unami hè, and Ma…

hey Middle English *hē Old English

View etymology graph ->

Topics

External links

# hey

**Type:** Word
**Level:** A2
**Part of speech:** intj
**IPA (US):** /heɪ/
**Frequency rank:** 96

## Meanings
1. An informal way of saying hello.
2. Said to get someone's attention.
3. Said to show surprise.
4. Said to protest or tell someone off.

## Examples
- Hey! How's it going?
- Hey, look at this!
- Hey, this is new!
- Hey! Stop that!

## Synonyms
- ahem
- ahoy
- cooee
- hello
- heyo
- hoi
- howdy
- wotcher
- wow
- yo
- yoohoo
- yowzah

## Derived Forms
- heyday
- heyo
- yehey

## Related Forms
- attention
- huh

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: hey
- Root: *hē

## Etymology
From Middle English hey, hei, also without h- in ey, from Old English *hē, ēa (interjection), attested as first element in hēlā, ēalā (“O!, alas!, oh!, lo!”). Cognate with Dutch hé, hei (“hi, hey”), German hei (“hey, wow”), Danish and Swedish hej (“hello, hey”), Faroese hey (“hey, hello”), Old Norse, Icelandic and Norwegian hei (“hey”), Polish hej (“hey, hello”), Romanian hei, Russian эй (ej, “hey”); see heigh. Probably a natural expression, as may be inferred from its presence with similar meaning in many other unrelated languages: for example, Burmese ဟေး (he:), Finnish hei, Unami hè, and Ma…

## AI Etymology
Hey comes from Middle English hey, hei, also without h- in ey, from Old English *hē, ēa (interjection), attested as first element in hēlā, ēalā (“O!, alas!, oh!, lo!”). Cognate with Dutch hé, hei (“hi, hey”), German hei (“hey, wow”), Danish and Swedish hej (“hello, hey”), Faroese hey (“hey, hello”), Old Norse, Icelandic and Norwegian hei (“hey”), Polish hej (“hey, hello”), Romanian hei, Russian эй (ej, “hey”); see heigh. In current use, the main senses are “An informal way of saying hello” and “Said to get someone's attention”.

## Topics
- Register & Style
- General Vocabulary

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hey

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